Archive for January 2013

So I was catching up on Twitter and blog reading, and I came along this post. Kyle Neath has always kind of cracked me up — that photo on Twitter — but the blog post about how the internet can level the playing field is great. To paraphrase, he didn’t know the value of his early work, and found solace through a Ruby on Rails community.

It took me until early 2009 for me to realize the real value of this network. I was miserable at my job and I sent a long-winded email to court3nay inquiring about working with ENTP. ENTP was a half-product, half-consulting agency at this point comprised almost solely of caboosers. All of whom had never met me or ever heard my voice. About 30 seconds later I got a response:

Hey Kyle,

That’s pretty fuckin awesome, if you’ll pardon my french.

We’re just heading out to breakfast, I mean, an important company meeting, but I’ll get back to you today.

Courtenay & Rick

And then a follow up:

OK, I’ve talked it over with everyone (unanimous— “kyle? awesome!”)
I think you’ll fit into our team perfectly.

No in person interview. No phone calls. No technical test. They were confident enough in my pixels to give me what equated to my dream job at that point in my life.

Really fucking crazy.

This industry we work in is magical. For the first time in human history, it’s possible to be represented (almost) solely through the merits of your work. Build something magical, push it up to GitHub under a pseudonym, and you could become one of the most sought after programmers in the world.

Rogers has been responsive at doing this investigation. Here’s the recap.

Double Plus: I recieved a call from the office of the president, promptly. They want to solve this. I got a very responsive person that seemed to understand the situation.

Plus: They acknowledged I emailed several vice presidents in the company.

Plus: I sent them a list of articles and support posts about phantom roaming charges. There apparently is a bug for older iOS devices (version iOS 4 and 5) where if the phone is set to auto download music and applications, data roaming will be activated. Neither Apple nor mobile companies that I know of have acknowledged this bug.

Minus: I was offered the “if you buy the $100 package retroactively, we’ll forgive the rest of the bill” solution. I explained to the representative, “That’s great, but that’s an admission of guilt and not a real solution.” These are electronic systems that have no physical cost for this roaming issue other than increasing profits.

I get it — not everyday are they going to get someone on the other end the designs iPhone applications, has travelled internationally, is comfortable with social media and can navigate email systems. But their customer service runs the risk every day when they mistreat customers. This is all bad press, and probably will cost them customers.

They would get a lot better press if they said, “We’ll forgive this,” and would probably get a renewed contract that’s worth over $2,000 over the next year. Otherwise, there’s a good chance they’ll lose a customer over this. Sean Van Tyne, a friend of mine, talks about how good service breeds loyal customers.

A great service design culture really starts from the top. Loyalty comes from the promises companies make to their customers. Period.

Here’s a few recommendations:

Users should be able to remove automatic billing from their account. I get it, you want to get them on the phone. Comcast is a master of this, especially when you want to cancel the account, but their service representatives turn it into a sale. This, however, a) pisses off users and b) probably contributes to the customer service costs. I’m embarrassed as a member of the User Experience field that any UX Designer would allow Black Hat UX to happen.

Connect the technical support and customer service systems. I shouldn’t have to be transferred every time another department needed to speak with me. There’s nothing more aggravating than, “I don’t know the answer to this, I need to transfer you.” Again, added costs for answering simple questions.

Properly train your representatives on the devices your customers use. 30 percent of your customers use iPhones. If they don’t understand that the iPhone setting for data roaming are three screens down, or think the phones have magic powers, you have alienated 30 percent of your customer base. This isn’t a fragmented Android market — it’s a device that is a single hardware platform and very, very predictable.

Look at issues, and resolve them by looking at the ROI. The amount of time spent on this issue by all parties involved will cost much more than the $619. As a former product manager, sometimes cutting your loses is best for the business.

Really poor customer service. So poor, I have to take to social media to get any proper attention.

A friend of mine received a phone bill from Rogers Communications, a cellular company in Canada. On it was $619 for international roaming charges — six days in Hong Kong and China which no one could explain. She was there for two months, and is very experienced international traveller.

She knows how to turn data roaming off.

What’s worse is the customer service received in response to this issue:

Reported the issue originally on Jan 2.

Called back several times.

Still have not gotten an answer as of today, 20 days later.

Was hung up on three times, twice today.

Was told by the first customer service representative that iPhone applications can automatically turn on data roaming without the user knowing it. To someone who designs iPhone applications, and knows this is not the case.

Was told by the second customer service representative that the roaming settings are easy to accidentally turn. You know, the settings that are three menus down on an iPhone.

Had to call a customer service representative to remove automatic billing (there’s no option on the website). That is black hat UX, and not customer friendly.

Their technical support department can’t see billing records, and vice versa, which is even worse from a business process prospective. Very customer unfriendly.

Customers cannot walk into a Rogers store and resolve an issue easily. You know, like Verizon or AT&T.

20 days.

Several incorrect answers that less experienced people would have accepted.

No resolution other than one representative offering to be put on a pre-paid plan of 80 dollars. That would have meant paying 80 dollars for phantom usage. She was running from Starbucks to Starbucks to get her email.

All this trouble for a customer who’s cellular phone contract is up for renewal. You know, a customer that’s been with them 10 years, and through all this doesn’t want to switch companies.

This originally published over at UXMas, where they were kind enough to let me guest blog (how festive!). They also did a wonderful job of editing the content.

Here’s the post:

User experience designers are storytellers.

The stories that you tell in client meetings and job interviews are about the applications you design. The best stories are thoughtful, compelling and successful. Each story that you tell builds upon your library of experience—it shows the arc of your career and why you should be hired.

However, how you tell your story is as important as the story itself.

How do you tell your story? If you’re uncertain, here are a few ideas that may help.

Tell One or Two Big Stories

There should be at least one or two projects that you can tell a user experience story about, from inception to release. This means showing off some actual project deliverables—for instance:

Once you’ve set the scene, it’s time to play your trump card: demonstrate the only deliverable that truly matters—the final product.

When talking about my portfolio, I frequently talk about Jobvite because we were able to achieve the full lifecycle on that project. However I also talk about a small business called Bob The Chiropractor, because it’s big story about a small business. It’s a project that demonstrates how, even with limited resources, you can achieve great things.

Tell A Bunch Of Small Stories

Not every UX Designer gets to experience the complete user experience lifecycle on every project, so it may be necessary to show how you took an existing product, made some changes, and improved the product as a result.

Small stories are very important because they show how you can think on your feet and draw on your past experience to make informed design decisions. They also demonstrate to organizations that you’re able to fit into a larger team.

When telling a small story, it’s even more important to include the final product. Your stories should always be results-driven. Whether they’re stories about big or small projects, you need to show the positive effect that your work had for your story to make an impact.

Tell Stories That Fit Your Audience

Every time you tell a story, there are embellishments and changes that you naturally make fit your audience. For example, you don’t use the same language with your mother that you do with your friends.

The same goes with your user experience stories.

Tell your story differently, depending on whom you’re talking to—whether it’s another designer, a product manager, or even the CEO. Each of these individuals needs to hear how your story fits within their context, so you should change the message accordingly.

Telling your story also depends on the organizational context: the stories you talk about for an e-commerce project will be different than for a content-driven intranet, so you may have to research your audience to ensure you’re telling the right stories.

Tell Stories That Sell

You should practice your stories, and be able to elaborate on them when questions come up. It’s not enough to tell your story using an electronic portfolio—you should be able to walk up to a whiteboard and explain the story visually, so that your future employer or client understands fully.

Walking someone through the deliverables you produced on projects big and small is a great well to sell yourself. I love seeing photos of people working together, organizing information with a bunch of post-it notes, because it shows a thought process that is more than shiny wireframes.

Weaving together great stories is a matter of pacing and keeping the audienceengaged. Remember, you should be telling your best stories—a project that ends without any lessons learned isn’t very engaging. Always aim for quality overquantity.

Tell Stories That Have A Great Ending

The best way to illustrate your value as a user experience designer is to not talk about the great wireframes you built for a project, but how your work translated into a measurable return on investment for your company or your client.

When a project is coming to a close, make a point of capturing facts that you can use to sell yourself in the future. For example,

Our user research and changes to the application increased engagement 10-fold.
Conversion increased 400 per cent over one month through A/B testing.

Most design is very subjective, but results that were achieved due to the work you performed is not.

Tell Your Story

Creating a kick-ass UX portfolio is all about defining who you are. Why are you good at user experience? How can you communicate your experiences in a compelling fashion?